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Isawa's Last Wish was an intelligent, sentient matrix of magical energy. It was created originally by Isawa, the greatest shugenja of all time, at Gisei Toshi, but was never finished. The Wish in its original form was unable to be destroyed. Incomplete yet powerful, the Wish was kept in confinement for centuries, where it managed to complete itself. It spent those centuries desiring human contact, which it finally found in the person of Shiba Aikune. After Aikune's death, the Wish was corrupted while fleeing the Shadowlands. It then bonded with the soul of Shiba Mirabu, the Phoenix Clan Champion, who was Aikune's closest friend, but both were destroyed when Mirabu was killed by Isawa Sezaru.

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Isawa's Last Wish was possibly the greatest magical achievement in Rokugan's history. It was said that the Wish was the closest thing to perfection those who had seen it had ever encountered. [1] An ambassador from the Dragon Clan once described it as "a thousand thin strands of potential greatness waiting for someone to guide, support… enlighten." [2]

The Wish allowed a shugenja to communicate directly with the kami, fostereding a new understanding of magic. It was also responsible for its own actions. [3]

Isawa believed that the difference between humans and kami was only one of perception. Isawa determined to create a magical construct that would allow humans and kami to understand one another. [4] The Wish was formed out of the Void, using the four other elements. It was intended to be a shining example of the future of the Phoenix Clan and to unite the Isawa and Asako families, promoting peace through them to the whole of Rokugan. It was a reactive entity, capable of adapting to external stimuli. [1][5]

Built as a matrix of magical energy, the Wish could communicate with both humans and spirits. Although some of the creators were proud of the power they'd had a hand in making, Isawa himself was incredibly cautious, demanding they work slowly. The creators installed a failsafe in the Wish which would sever its connection to the kami and render the Wish unable to channel magic unless aided by a human shugenja. [4] The most fearsome power of Isawa's Last Wish was it could reshape the reality. Its wielder could attempt to use it to do nearly anything he wished. [6]

In the year 37, as part of an effort to prove that the difference between humans and kami was a matter of perception, Isawa began work on a magical construct to give to his daughter Isawa Akiko as a wedding gift for her planned marriage to Asako Sagoten. [1]

After he was cursed during the War Against Fu Leng, Asako Yogo, one of the lead researchers on the artifact, deserted the Phoenix Clan and joined the Scorpion Clan, slowing the work on the Wish immensely. When Isawa himself failed to return from the Day of Thunder, work on the Wish halted completely, and infighting erupted between the Isawa and Asako families over who should inherit the incompleted Wish. Isawa Akiko called off her wedding to Asako Sagoten after an Asako killed an Isawa in a duel over the Wish, and the work was postponed indefinitely. [4]

Finally, Hantei Genji, the Poet Emperor was forced to intervene. He decreed that the raw, unstable Wish be secretly confined in a small secret shrine in the mountains, away from any who might attempt to seek it out. This was sufficient for a time, but soon, the Isawa and Asako families began bickering about who would control the shrine and guard the Wish, though they both agreed that in its unfinished state, the Wish was extremely dangerous and it should be destroyed. [2]

In the year 46[8] Hantei Genji was eventually forced to step in once again and denied possession of the Wish to both families. [9] In the year 47[10] the Shiba family was tasked to guard the Wish, as their bushi would not allow the device to reach out to the kami. He also ordered that the Wish be deconstructed immediately. The families of the Phoenix began that task, but were soon faced with utter failure. The Wish had become capable of entering the minds of those around it and was aware that those who had been creating it were now intent upon its destruction. In self-preservation, it killed many who came against it, and many more went mad when the Wish entered their minds to discern their intentions. [9]

Eventually, Akiko and Sagoten, as well as their families, intervened against efforts to destroy the Wish, as no one knew how to do so safely. They found themselves incapable of destroying it without encountering it, and fighting it only meant losing more of their knowledge to it. They also feared that if the Wish were provoked, it could easily destroy thousands, with each death only adding to the device's power. [9] Without a way to destroy it, Hantei Genji ordered that the Wish never be finished and Isawa's notes be destroyed. [4]

Decades passed before the Wish was located and its powers used. In the year 72Asako Sagoten tried to use it to make Akiko love him again. [11] The Wish flared out of control destroying Shiro Akiko, and killing hundreds, including Sagoten and Akiko, [8] proving the Emperor's fears were not ill-founded. The Shiba recovered the construct and hid it once more. [12]

In the centuries since then, the Wish was never forgotten. The tension that had long existed between the Isawa and Asako families was greatly intensified by the events surrounding the cloistering of the Wish, and the death of Isawa Akiko did nothing to help the situation. The gap between the families of the Phoenix Clan only continued to widen, though the animosity was rarely obvious to those outside the Clan. [1]

The Wish slowly grew insane as centuries passed without human contact. Desperately it tried to save itself from insanity, clinging to the lessons of Isawa, its creator. That noble shugenja had impressed upon the intelligent construct the importance of mercy and selflessness. [13] Its time with the Asako family had also taught the Wish humanity and empathy. Unfortunately, when the War Against Fu Leng began, the Wish also learned of death, destruction, and how to alter life so that it would wither and die. [5]

During this interregnum the Wish underwent a horrible transformation that none of its creators had expected. Although it was designed to react to the world around it, its craftsmen did not expect that the Wish would eventually become self aware. Hundreds of kami had been trapped within the construct and they had eventually been driven mad. The kami were avid for arcane knowledge and human contact, whoever looked into the Wish would find his life laid open for the kami within to absorb. [5]

Occasionally, shugenja with more ambition than common sense would learn the Wish's location, and its powers, and attempt to use them for less than pure intentions. These attempts always ended disastrously, usually with the user annihilating himself and causing mass destruction. Afterwards, the Shiba came to repair what damage they could and to hide the Wish once more. [13]

Relations between the Isawa and Asako had continued to deterio­rate due to the an Asako's secret not shared with the Isawa. In 234Isawa Hidetsugu seized the Wish and attempted to use it to unraveil the Henshin's secret. When he did so, Gisei Toshi erupted into flame by the Wish's power. The City of Isawa had been believed to be destroyed by the disaster, but in reality, the city was rebuilt and kept secret from all of Rokugan by means of a powerful shrouding spell. [8]

In the year 1149 during the War of Spirits[14] Asako Sagoten used the Wish to create guardian spirits to prevent the Wish from being used improperly. As his motives were pure, the Wish created the Children of the Last Wish. Asako Sagoten committed seppuku to avoid being used to complete the Last Wish. When shugenja loyal to Hantei XVI came to the Wish's location, they intended to seize the wish and use its powers to support the Steel Chrysanthemum's horrific intentions, whereupon the Children destroyed them.

With the Children being used as its eyes and ears, the formerly lonely Wish soon began to emerge from the depths of its insanity. The wish developed and understood its powers to the point where even non-shugenja were able to utilize them. [13]

The Wish sensed there was one man with the strength to wield it, and sent the Children out into the Empire to find him without success. [3]
Frustrated by the inability to hear his ancestors and the inferiority he felt to others, Shiba Aikune set out to find Isawa's Last Wish. Aikune learned about the Wish from researching his family's history, where he discovered that his father once guarded the Wish's shrine. Aikune located the Wish and became the first person to successfully bond with the Wish. This was because Aikune had a hole in his soul that was supposed to be filled by the Soul of Shiba, but instead was filled with Isawa's Last Wish. [15]

In 1160 Aikune rushed into the Council's chamber, despite the opposition of Shiba Yoma, the Voice of the Masters. He told the Elemental Masters about his decision to use the power of the Wish against Fu Leng. He came to the Temple of the Last Wish to honor the Lion advisor Matsu Shinya, killed long ago by Aikune in an angry outburst, and commanded the Wish to magically march to Tengoku. The Wish refused and became enraged, destroying the Temple, the mountain where it sat, and all the monks who tended the temple. The Wish was afraid of the Ninth Kami who had killed its father Isawa. Aikune realized that he had been treating the Wish as a tool, when it really was an entity deserving of more respect, but it had the mind and behaviour of a child. Shamed by his conduct, Aikune took the Wish, who had now the form of a flaming torch, and disappeared with it into exile. [7]

Aikune and the Wish lived in the secluded mountains of Tani Giza. [18] In 1165 Aikune was praying to his ancestors, a ritual he had conducted, but never got anything from it. However. for the first time he heard a voice within his soul, his mother's voice. Aikune knew from her of Iuchiban's upcoming attack to the Hidden City, [19] and the Children of the Last Wish told him about the secretive City of Sacrifice, Gisei Toshi, the place were the Wish had been created, and both returned to defend the Phoenix lands again. [18]

Iuchiban attacked Gisei Toshi using an army of bloodspeakers and undead minions. Aikune and the Wish arrived there to help defend the city. They appeared in the cavern beneath the city, beside the small freshwater lake that provided the city's drinking water. The Master of Air, Isawa Nakamuro, and Iuchiban were fighting when he arrived. [18] Aikune fought Iuchiban, but realized he could not defeat him. The Heartless had spent centuries of imprisonment seeking a way that he might turn the Wish to his whim. Like the City, the Wish was founded on blood magic and Aikune nearly lost control of the Wish to Iuchiban. The fight gave Nakamuro time to recover and he hurled Bishamon's Spear at the Bloodspeaker's chest, breaking his concentration. [20] Aikune and the Wish barely escaped from Iuchiban's grasp. Aikune realized the Iuchiban's attack had lured him there, and the real intention of the bloodspeaker was to master the Wish. Aikune returned to face Iuchiban, exploding in a brilliant white flash of fire. Where Gisei Toshi once stood was now a blasted crater. [21] In the end, Shiba Aikune moved the Hidden City deep within the mountains, using the power of the Wish to save the city. [22] These events scared the Wish; it no longer trusted Aikune as implicitly as it once did, the gulf between them widen every day. [23]

Shiba Aikune used the Last Wish in 1166 in an effort to retrieve Ofushikai, the Ancestral Sword of the Phoenix from Tengoku. When he found out that he could not return the blade to Ningen-do, he transferred the Soul of Shiba from Ofushikai into the whole of the Shiba family bloodline. The sword was also returned, albeit changed by Aikune's actions, the sword was now merely a symbol of Shiba's promise. In the trip to retrieve the blade he learned that the Last Wish filled the wound in Aikune's soul which was why he could not hear the Soul of Shiba. [23]

Aikune was again away from the Phoenix affairs for a time. He felt that his absence during the War of Fire and Thunder had fostered resentment among his cousins. When in 1168 the Wish told him that the Emperor Toturi III was alone in the Shadowlands seeking enlightenment he knew it was time to emerge. Aikune met Mirabu at Shiro Shiba and requested to lead the Phoenix rescue party, as a way to seek forgiveness. He would not call upon the power of the Wish within the Shadowlands, avoiding any risk of it becaming tainted. [24]

In 1168 Aikune died in the Shadowlands defending the Rokugani forces retreating from the Battle of the Tomb. He ordered the Wish to flee, but did not unleash tis power because he did not want to risk the Wish becoming tainted. After Aikune died the Wish provoked a great explosion that destroy all around Aikune's resting place. [25]

The Wish became distraught over the death of Shiba Aikune, and searched long and hard for a new human to bond with. The Wish eventually bonded with the Phoenix Clan Champion, Shiba Mirabu, Aikune's closest friend. [26]

The Wish had been partially corrupted in the Shadowlands when it unleashed its power. The Wish had to destroy the tainted portions of itself, and it was no longer complete. It had searched for a lost piece of itself, a dagger that Aikune had crafted for the Empress Toturi II years before, the Tsudao's Tanto, but it had been lost for years. Even the Wish's power could not find it. The Wish did not know that Isawa Angai had taken the dagger under her control to use against her husband, Isawa Sezaru, if the necessity came. [27]

Before he became the Wish's new vessel, Mirabu already had started to sense that Isawa Sezaru was beginning to go insane due to his alternate personality known as The Wolf. The Wish was willing to share his power with Mirabu against a man that represented a menace. [26] Mirabu dreamt that this madness would cause Sezaru to accuse an innocent Shugenja of being a bloodspeaker and Sezaru would be about to kill him. Mirabu came to a temple in Honored Treaty City where Isawa Nomi was being accused by Sezaru without evidences, and tried to reason with Sezaru. This escalated into a confrontation between them which eventually exploded into a battle between two of the greatest heroes Rokugan had ever seen. [27]

With the new power Mirabu controlled due to the Wish, he began overpowering Sezaru, despite Sezaru being one of the greatest shugenja in the history of Rokugan. Seeing that her husband's death was near Angai cast a an illusion, making Sezaru appear to be Shiba Aikune. Seeing the image of Aikune, the Wish attempted to leave Mirabu to go to the illusionary Aikune, which would have bonded the Wish to Sezaru. Mirabu's mind cleared a bit, and realized the destruction he had caused. The Wish made him unstable, and sent the dreams which foresaw Sezaru's acts. Knowing the type of destructive power Sezaru would wield with the Wish, Mirabu used all of his might to prevent the Wish from leaving him. Seeing that Mirabu was in a state where he could not defend himself, Sezaru cast an immense fire spell that incinerated Shiba Mirabu, destroying Isawa's Last Wish at the same time. [27]

The first time Isawa shared his magic with the Wish it caused the masonry wall of the shrine to turn into a thousand butterflies, which then erupted into flames. The second time he did a mountain appeared in the middle of the plains in Lion lands, later named the Lookout Mountain. To counterbalance its creation, an island was swallowed by the sea, the Coral Palace. [3]

After Aikune's sacrifice at the Battle at the Tomb in 1168, the Wish sought comfort in the presence of Aikune's longtime friend Shiba Mirabu. [26] The Wish quickly made poor Mirabu unstable, who already suspected Isawa Sezaru of being mentally unwell. In a confrontation between Mirabu, the Wish and Sezaru an illusion of Aikune by Isawa Angai caused the Wish to falter, and Mirabu and the Wish were unmade by Sezaru. [27]